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Monthly Archives: March 2013

The weather was bad, and Sergio’s family all left the house in a hurry. They didn’t secure the screen door properly, and the wind caught it, tearing it off the hinges. When UPS stopped by with an Amazon package, the driver could have said, “Aw, that’s a shame,” tossed their package on his porch, and then gone on with his day. He did not.

Kindness and a note.

Sergio writes:

Despite today’s weather here in [redacted] I came home to a pleasant surprise. It looked as if during my morning rush to get our child to the sitter and getting to work on time that I had not properly closed our screen door.

With the high winds here in the area our poor door was partially ripped off the hinges. But, a very thoughtful UPS driver who was dropping off a package for my wife saw our door and not only tapped our door shut but grabbed a one of our porch chairs and secured the door and the package to keep it all from flying away.

I know Wayne was more than likely hating the weather and is probably closely timed on his routes. He didn’t have to do anything, but he did. I hope UPS sees this and rewards him appropriately.

UPS pays $40 million to end federal probe connected to deliveries

SAN FRANCISCO — Shipping company UPS agreed Friday to pay $40 million to end a federal criminal probe connected to deliveries it made for illicit online pharmacies. The Department of Justice announced that the Atlanta-based company would also “take steps” to block illicit online drug dealers from using their delivery service. The DOJ said the fine amount is the money UPS collected from suspect online pharmacies. UPS won’t be charged with any crimes. “We believe we have an obligation and responsibility to help curb the sale and shipment of drugs sold through illegal Internet pharmacies,” UPS spokesman Bill Tanner said. “UPS will pay a $40 million penalty and has agreed to enhance its compliance policies with respect to Internet pharmacy shippers.” Its biggest rival, FedEx Corp., still remains a target in the federal investigation, according to its March 21 quarterly report filed with the Security and Exchange Commission. “We believe that our employees have acted in good faith at all times,” FedEx stated in its regulatory filing. “We do not believe that we have engaged in any illegal activities and will vigorously defend ourselves in any action that may result from the investigation.” FedEx said it received subpoenas from a federal grand jury in San Francisco in 2008 and 2009. The San Francisco U.S. Attorney’s office has played a central role in a nationwide crackdown on online pharmacies. Ten people with ties to online pharmacies have been convicted over the last two years. “It is unclear what federal laws UPS may have violated,” FedEx said in a statement Friday. “We remain confident that we are in compliance with federal law.” The DOJ said some UPS employees knew the company was making deliveries between 2003 and 2010 for pharmacies that filled orders for dangerous drugs without proper prescriptions from doctors.

Alice the Malice Rivlin went on with Andrea Mitchell yesterday to discuss the boring sequester debate and, as usual, she trumpets what every other deficit scold in the Beltway says: Cut entitlements or adopt Simpson-Bowles. At least she admits that switching to a chained CPI is an actual cut in benefits.

Rivlin:… one thing is the reform of the consumer price index which is really a technical adjustment, but it would mean slightly lower social security benefits and other benefits going forward. Now you could offset that with other changes in the law, but it is the right thing to do and his own troops were kind of unhappy about that, but he put it out there and he has certainly put Medicare adjustments, various sorts on the table.

Now, why is cutting benefits to seniors the ‘right thing’ to do, Alice? Why do we have to pay for the Iraq and Afghanistan war and not the rich? And why do we have to pay for the financial economic collapse and not the rich, Alice? And WTF are these mythical offsets to draconian cuts to Social Security that she speaks of? Is she talking about the proposed ‘birthday bump? That’s really a horseshit thing to do.

Some propose adopting the chained CPI with an added “birthday bump” – a 1percent benefit increase for each of years 20 to 24 after initial retirement eligibility. But this supposed “sweetener” only affects those who live until becoming eligible for the birthday bump. Wealthier seniors live longer than their lower-income counterparts, so the “birthday bump” does not adequately protect those who need Social Security benefits the most. Even with it, the birthday bump does not fully compensate for the cut the chained CPI entails.

The problem is not that their private pensions run out. (Not very many people have private pensions anymore.) The problem is that the Chained-CPI reduces the cost of living adjustment down by 0.3 percentage points annually.That translates into a cut in benefits of 3 percent for those who have been retired ten years, 6 percent after 20 years, and 9 percent after 30 years.

The people who have been retired the longest and are, therefore, the poorest, will see the largest cuts. A 1% “bump” isn’t going to make much of a difference. This is a cut. And it’s substantial. It will affect the poor the most and it’s going to take a lot more than “tweaking” to make up for it. Moreover, it’s not just the poorest of the poor who will be affected. There seems to be some belief in Washington circles that 70-year-olds who are living on 25k- 35k a year won’t feel a cut in their incomes, which just goes to show how distant they are from the way people really live.

And why bring in Social Security at all, since it has nothing to do with the federal deficit? The GOP needs its pound of flesh from the working class, but the Beltway never asks them why? Why be so f*&king cruel and inhumane? I wish we lived in the Land of Oz and we could throw water on the Fix The Debt and Alice Rivkin assholes of the world so that they would all melt away for good.

The entire Beltway cable TV establishment never has on any liberal members of Congress or any other proponents that are against cutting safety net benefits –except when they want a Crossfire-style formatted segment with another deficit scold.(h/t Scarce for the video)

The Teamsters Union over the weekend disclosed for the first time the broad strokes of a contract proposal made to UPS Inc., as the company races to ink a tentative pact with the union by month’s end to avoid possible shipper defections to rival FedEx Corp.

Ken Hall, director of the union’s package division, outlined the Teamsters proposal, which calls for a five-year contract, in a national conference call Saturday with UPS shop stewards. All UPS Teamsters would receive a $1-per-hour wage increase in each year of the contract and a $1.50-per-hour annual increase from current levels to cover pension and health benefits. The current contract, signed in 2007, calls for a $1 an hour annual increase in the company’s contribution benefits.

The union proposal also calls for the creation of an undefined number of so-called “22.3 jobs” in each year of the contract. Those jobs are named after the article in the 1997 agreement reached after the Teamsters shut down UPS that summer with a 15-day strike. The language of the article required the company to create 20,000 full-time jobs between 1998 and 2008 by combining part-time positions into full-time work. The Teamsters, and in particular the dissident group Teamsters for a Democratic Union (TDU), have said UPS has not done all that it could to create that many full-time positions.

The proposal would increase the starting pay for part-timers to $15 an hour from the current $8.50 an hour. The union will not accept any contract offer calling for active members to pay premiums on their health insurance.

The contents of Hall’s proposal were contained in a communiqué by TDU issued soon after the conference call ended.

TDU said in the communiqué that Hall reviewed a “series of tentative agreements” relating to the company’s “SurePost” program with the U.S. Postal Service (USPS). Under the program, UPS transports packages—mostly merchandise ordered online—deep into the USPS physical network, where it is delivered the “last mile” to the final destination by letter carrier. The program is offered at low cost to retailers and e-tailers and has been a successful revenue-generator. However, the Teamsters have long complained that SurePost takes business away from UPS drivers.

One of the proposals, according to TDU, would require that all SurePost parcels weighing more than 10 pounds or wider than 3 feet would be delivered by a UPS driver. Hall said a program called “SurePost Redirect,” where UPS uses technology to reroute SurePost packages to the UPS system and away from the Post Office, has resulted in 20 percent of all SurePost shipments moved by UPS drivers.

UPS did not return a request for comment. The Teamsters declined to comment on Hall’s proposal or even confirm that he had made one. It is believed UPS is seeking a seven-year contract, which the union does not favor.

The current agreement expires at the end of July, and both sides have been negotiating on and off since September with the goal of announcing a tentative agreement by the end of March. In its weekly “Friday Freight” column published March 22, investment firm Wolfe Trahan said it was told by an unidentified Teamster source that it’s unlikely a tentative deal will be struck by the end of March due to the complications surrounding the health care discussions. However, the contact expressed confidence that a deal will get done long before July.

The firm also said it’s been told by some shippers they would accelerate shifts in volumes to FedEx starting next month if a tentative deal isn’t reached by March 31. Ed Wolfe, a long-time transport analyst and co-founder of the firm, surmised that diversion is already occurring. Wolfe noted that FedEx reported a 15-percent year-over-year increase in ground volumes in its fiscal third quarter that ended in February. That compares to year-over-year gains of 11 and 8 percent, respectively, in the prior two fiscal quarters, he said.

The volume figures include shipments generated by FedEx’s own initiative with the USPS, called “SmartPost.”

7NEWSThe Tea Party boycotted Fox News for the second time this month, saying the cable network is too liberal.

Tea Party members organized the second boycott of Fox News from Thursday, March 21 at 6 a.m. through Sunday, March 24 at 6 a.m. because they say the channel “turned Left,” according to the blog Benghazi Truth.

The blog alleges that the Obama administration organized a media-supported “cover-up” of the events surrounding the 2012 attacks on an American diplomatic mission at Benghazi in Libya.

Fox News has a reputation of representing a conservative perspective on political issues.

Written primarily by Frank M. Davis, Jr., a Tea Party supporter, the blog helped to organize and promote both boycotts. Kathy Amidon, a Tea Party activist from Nashville, Tenn., is also a driving force behind the boycotts.

The first boycott began Friday, March 8 and lasted through March 9.

A post on Benghazi Truth on Saturday says that the group “will rally over 1 million people to boycott FOX until it TURNS RIGHT, or until… everyone just walks away from the smoldering ash-heap that was once ‘Fair and Balanced.'”

The group’s boycott is focused solely on Fox News.

“FOX needs the Tea Party/conservatives more than the conservatives need FOX after FOX turned left, basically selling out the people who made FOX successful in an attempt to earn an extra buck,” a post on the blog reads. “FOX is extremely vulnerable to these boycotts while the rest of the (mainstream media) doesn’t need us at all, to speak of.”

Hjerleid’s blog post alleges that media outlets are using techniques “used by Hitler” in order to “indoctrinate the masses.”

The post specifically criticizes Sean Hannity for his TV special “Benghazi: 6 Months Of Deceit,” saying that the program included “absolutely nothing new on Benghazi.”

Hjerleid writes that “we need to be careful what we see and hear” on the news.

“If we keep silent about (Fox News’) shortcomings, then they can get away with shading their coverage further Left,” Hjerleid writes. “I for one oppose that. They can make adjustments or I will get my news elsewhere.”

If we don’t make it clear to the President that we will not stand for Raised Medicare Eligibility Age, or the stupid “Chained CPI” method of inflation increases within Social Security, it will be what we get. Let Him Know Today.